The Lord’s commandments can be viewed as invitations to desire, think, and act more like he does. They can be found in rules that are either obeyed or disobeyed, in principles that should guide our decisions, or as extensions of his character that we can emulate. Out of these three, his character is the basis from which we can gain the most extensive and accurate understanding of his commandments and from which we can draw the most strength when exercising our faith in him.
Faith is required to advance from obedience to rules, to adherence to principles, to transformation of character. The objective in each case is to know God more than one presently does, and this can only occur through first obtaining and then acting according to a correct idea of what is not presently known.
The greatest faith can only be exercised once a person understands and believes in God’s character. At this point, they have full trust in him— not because of their exact knowledge of why what they are going through is good, but because they know that given the Father’s love and knowledge, anything that comes from him must be good, no matter how bad it seems. This is how a person “...[puts] off the natural man and [becomes] a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.” (Mosiah 3:19) It is through this unshakable confidence in God that we endure all things, obey all things, and become as he is.
Considering the Lord’s character traits individually can increase our faith in him. The Lord’s character is a composite of various specific attributes. This chapter will investigate how we can have faith in the Lord’s mercy, knowledge, justice, and love.